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The Gollancz Book of South Asian Science Fiction, Volume 2
From sinister plans of xenocide to speciesists who have taken it upon themselves to Off-World those unlike them; from simulations that memorialize stories obliterated by a book-burning world to the Master Pain Merchant who is always at hand to administer a dose of long-forgotten sensations; from genetically modified Glow Girls who can kill with a touch to a droid detective actively seeking out justice - this stellar volume of cutting-edge science fiction showcases, in prose and verse, 32 of the most powerful voices in the genre from the Indian Subcontinent. Taking forward the formidable task achieved to critical acclaim by the first volume of The Gollancz Book of South Asian Science Fiction, the present collection masterfully transports readers to worlds strangely familiar, raises crucial questions about the place of humans in the universe, and testifies to the astonishing range and power of the imaginative mind.
454 pages, Hardcover
First published September 25, 2021
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
February 13, 2022
I may not love every story in this collection but as a whole, I am very glad that this collection of speculative fiction exists. The collection has great variety of voices and reflects culture, politics and social issues in this speculative fiction setting.
1. And now his lordship is laughing by Shiv Ramdas: Set during (British induced) Bengal famine, an artisan avenges her village who are forced to give up rice for the war effort. When a young ward of her dies and while she herself is dying due to starvation, she is presented with an offer.
2. Jupiter, dark sister by Medha Singh: A poem for/about Jupiter.
3. The Traveler by Tashan Mehta: This is incredibly well written - of discoveries and dreams, of travels and memories, of myths and legends. Tashan Mehta wrote one of my favorite stories from the fantasy short story collection Magical women. Was it a dream, a reflection of desire or a truly magical place?
4. The Zoo by Muhammad Zafar Iqbal (translated by Arunava Sinha): Nazi medical experiment revitalized by a megalomaniac.
5. The maker of memories by Vajra Chandrasekara: This was okay, it took me couple of re-reads to understand this however the impact didn't land as it was perhaps intended to.
6. The glow-in-the-dark girls by Senaa Ahmad: This was sad, a metaphor for the women who remain forgotten and/or discarded by the employers, society and those who are are supposed to protect them. And when they do go get talked about, they are infantalized as girls. Its quite heartbreaking and very well written.
7. The Pain merchant by Manjula Padmanabhan: I liked this a lot better than the one I read by the same author in Volume 1. I didn't expect the story to go the way it did, I admit I wasn't very much into it till the very last page. Pain is such a fascinating thing that our mind enforces - happens physically, can happen emotionally and the psychosomatic response to certain emotions.
8. The ministry of relevance by Arjun Raj Gaind: Ah, the dystopia emerging out of social media explosion and tied to identity. Willing to be private about our opinions can now be deemed offensive. When this thing that's already happening to a certain extent in online sphere (I was rejected from employment because I didn't have a Linkdin account and actual five rounds of technical interviews didn't matter), this story takes this ideology a step further and sets up in a world where social interaction is rated and the relevance of a person in the society is decided.
9. Dimensions of life under fascism by Jayaprakash Satyamurthy: From the same city as the author, his collection of horror stories was inspired to make the hit horror movie Stree. This story is speculative, a sort of dystopian with extreme political right being in power with weird happenings around the city. Its a recipe for tragedy.
10. The song of ice by Sona Mguha (translated by Arunava Sinha): I was with the story for few pages after which I gave up. DNF. Will try again another day.
11. Goodbye is the shape of a palm pressed to the sky by Lavanya Lakshminarayan: This story has stayed with me for days now, its simplistic start gives away to a wonderfully complex world that future takes. The story is lovely on its own right but it definitely deserves a novel length fiction. Am pretty sure it will be spectacular.
12. Almost Human by Kehkashan Khalid: /i> This was a pleasant surprise. A story about robots, self awareness, identity and, well, a murder investigation. The investigation is done by a cop and a robot named NCH005. The model of robot is outdated and there are many people who carry dated ideologies in their hearts as well. This is a fascinating story indeed.
13. Looney ka tabadla by Bina Singh: I rushed through this as I wasn't enjoying it. Satire didn't land for me.
14. Paley's watch by Anil Menon: The author made an appearance in Volume 1 - the story was okay, but, the humor didn't work for me. Paley's watch though written in similar vein, paints broader strokes about humanity and the consciousness. Its an interesting read.
15. Elsewhere by Aparna Ramachandran: Okay, that was pretty good twist for what seemed like a flat narration. The themes are quite interesting as well.
16. Gift of the angels by Jayant V. Narlikar (translated by Archana Mirajkar):
17. A different sea by Vandana Singh: DNF. I couldn't connect to this story, at all.
18. The List by Gautam Bhatia: This was a lovely ambiguous story that is equal parts heartbreaking and interesting. What would humanity do to achieve permanence and perfect world? Would a planet sacrifice its own people so that the rest could live? If it did, then how would it go about it, the consequences of it all.
19. 2020-NKARV by Kaiser Haq: I am not sure about this. Its a miss.
20.
21. A species of least concern by Giti Chandra: One of the most fascinating stories from volume 1 was written by this author and it was both doozy and definitely required a novel length exploration. And we have a doozy one again, its pretty fun and quite dramatic. Very enjoyable.
22. Champollion's foot by Harris A. Durrani: This was a wild ride and plays like a movie!
23. Resurrection Points by Usmain T Malik: For first few pages, its hard to understand why this has made to SF collection as it reads almost like a contemporary political piece. In fact after reading the story, it works better in a modern political fiction collection than SF, but I am glad to have read it here.
24. Shambhala by Salik Shah: There is a sadness in displacement from where one's family came from, and the narrator of the story misses that kinship. In the political setting of Tibet, the narrator recounts their childhood and parallels with the children they teach in school, with politics more or less a traumatic stalemate.
25. Confessor by Yudhanjaya Wijaratne: This was a painful read, for the way state suppress voices of different opinions and in the end, control.
26. Scavenger by Priya Sarukkai Chabria: I really, really liked this poem. What a ride!
27. Biryani Bagh by Sami Ahmed Khan: This is one of my favorites from this collection. The story provides a great allegory to borders, political dissent and of course, bigotry. There is a pondering which is quite subtle where the narrator wonders if its all how its always supposed to be. Is the humanity's fate resigned to be this way (in 2020) and will expand to space as well?
28. Malini by Shovon Chowdhury: Okay, this wasn't fun but downright creepy. Imagine a guy obsessed with a voice on phone app and harassing people in the company to get to that person and arriving at her door. This isn't fun or romantic. This is criminal. And terrifying.
29. The Midas Touch by Sukanya Dattia: The setting of the story is quite impressive where mythological fiction has loose impact on history and where fairy tales are spoken with much seriousness. I loved the world more than the story.
30. The Arrival of the new world by Premee Mohamed: This has a mildly interesting setting but this didn't work for me, unfortunately.
31. The Diamond Library by Navin Weeraratne: State sanctioned story telling and linguistics. Its necessary to add that even language is heavily regulated. So in a world like this, how would a trillion book library look like? And what would happen when they find a book that's unsanctioned and belong to old times where languages were legal and talked about nature.
32. Bring your own spoon by Saad Z Hossain: This was the story I was looking most forward to in this collection. Unfortunately I haven't read the author's Djinn but have read Gurkha and Lord of Tuesday. Set in the same universe, a Djinn, a human and a river pirate try to open a restaurant in a world where food is made from algae. It could have been funny if the world wasn't so sad.
This was a good read.
1. And now his lordship is laughing by Shiv Ramdas: Set during (British induced) Bengal famine, an artisan avenges her village who are forced to give up rice for the war effort. When a young ward of her dies and while she herself is dying due to starvation, she is presented with an offer.
2. Jupiter, dark sister by Medha Singh: A poem for/about Jupiter.
3. The Traveler by Tashan Mehta: This is incredibly well written - of discoveries and dreams, of travels and memories, of myths and legends. Tashan Mehta wrote one of my favorite stories from the fantasy short story collection Magical women. Was it a dream, a reflection of desire or a truly magical place?
4. The Zoo by Muhammad Zafar Iqbal (translated by Arunava Sinha): Nazi medical experiment revitalized by a megalomaniac.
5. The maker of memories by Vajra Chandrasekara: This was okay, it took me couple of re-reads to understand this however the impact didn't land as it was perhaps intended to.
6. The glow-in-the-dark girls by Senaa Ahmad: This was sad, a metaphor for the women who remain forgotten and/or discarded by the employers, society and those who are are supposed to protect them. And when they do go get talked about, they are infantalized as girls. Its quite heartbreaking and very well written.
7. The Pain merchant by Manjula Padmanabhan: I liked this a lot better than the one I read by the same author in Volume 1. I didn't expect the story to go the way it did, I admit I wasn't very much into it till the very last page. Pain is such a fascinating thing that our mind enforces - happens physically, can happen emotionally and the psychosomatic response to certain emotions.
8. The ministry of relevance by Arjun Raj Gaind: Ah, the dystopia emerging out of social media explosion and tied to identity. Willing to be private about our opinions can now be deemed offensive. When this thing that's already happening to a certain extent in online sphere (I was rejected from employment because I didn't have a Linkdin account and actual five rounds of technical interviews didn't matter), this story takes this ideology a step further and sets up in a world where social interaction is rated and the relevance of a person in the society is decided.
9. Dimensions of life under fascism by Jayaprakash Satyamurthy: From the same city as the author, his collection of horror stories was inspired to make the hit horror movie Stree. This story is speculative, a sort of dystopian with extreme political right being in power with weird happenings around the city. Its a recipe for tragedy.
10. The song of ice by Sona Mguha (translated by Arunava Sinha): I was with the story for few pages after which I gave up. DNF. Will try again another day.
11. Goodbye is the shape of a palm pressed to the sky by Lavanya Lakshminarayan: This story has stayed with me for days now, its simplistic start gives away to a wonderfully complex world that future takes. The story is lovely on its own right but it definitely deserves a novel length fiction. Am pretty sure it will be spectacular.
12. Almost Human by Kehkashan Khalid: /i> This was a pleasant surprise. A story about robots, self awareness, identity and, well, a murder investigation. The investigation is done by a cop and a robot named NCH005. The model of robot is outdated and there are many people who carry dated ideologies in their hearts as well. This is a fascinating story indeed.
13. Looney ka tabadla by Bina Singh: I rushed through this as I wasn't enjoying it. Satire didn't land for me.
14. Paley's watch by Anil Menon: The author made an appearance in Volume 1 - the story was okay, but, the humor didn't work for me. Paley's watch though written in similar vein, paints broader strokes about humanity and the consciousness. Its an interesting read.
15. Elsewhere by Aparna Ramachandran: Okay, that was pretty good twist for what seemed like a flat narration. The themes are quite interesting as well.
16. Gift of the angels by Jayant V. Narlikar (translated by Archana Mirajkar):
17. A different sea by Vandana Singh: DNF. I couldn't connect to this story, at all.
18. The List by Gautam Bhatia: This was a lovely ambiguous story that is equal parts heartbreaking and interesting. What would humanity do to achieve permanence and perfect world? Would a planet sacrifice its own people so that the rest could live? If it did, then how would it go about it, the consequences of it all.
19. 2020-NKARV by Kaiser Haq: I am not sure about this. Its a miss.
20.
21. A species of least concern by Giti Chandra: One of the most fascinating stories from volume 1 was written by this author and it was both doozy and definitely required a novel length exploration. And we have a doozy one again, its pretty fun and quite dramatic. Very enjoyable.
22. Champollion's foot by Harris A. Durrani: This was a wild ride and plays like a movie!
23. Resurrection Points by Usmain T Malik: For first few pages, its hard to understand why this has made to SF collection as it reads almost like a contemporary political piece. In fact after reading the story, it works better in a modern political fiction collection than SF, but I am glad to have read it here.
24. Shambhala by Salik Shah: There is a sadness in displacement from where one's family came from, and the narrator of the story misses that kinship. In the political setting of Tibet, the narrator recounts their childhood and parallels with the children they teach in school, with politics more or less a traumatic stalemate.
25. Confessor by Yudhanjaya Wijaratne: This was a painful read, for the way state suppress voices of different opinions and in the end, control.
26. Scavenger by Priya Sarukkai Chabria: I really, really liked this poem. What a ride!
27. Biryani Bagh by Sami Ahmed Khan: This is one of my favorites from this collection. The story provides a great allegory to borders, political dissent and of course, bigotry. There is a pondering which is quite subtle where the narrator wonders if its all how its always supposed to be. Is the humanity's fate resigned to be this way (in 2020) and will expand to space as well?
28. Malini by Shovon Chowdhury: Okay, this wasn't fun but downright creepy. Imagine a guy obsessed with a voice on phone app and harassing people in the company to get to that person and arriving at her door. This isn't fun or romantic. This is criminal. And terrifying.
29. The Midas Touch by Sukanya Dattia: The setting of the story is quite impressive where mythological fiction has loose impact on history and where fairy tales are spoken with much seriousness. I loved the world more than the story.
30. The Arrival of the new world by Premee Mohamed: This has a mildly interesting setting but this didn't work for me, unfortunately.
31. The Diamond Library by Navin Weeraratne: State sanctioned story telling and linguistics. Its necessary to add that even language is heavily regulated. So in a world like this, how would a trillion book library look like? And what would happen when they find a book that's unsanctioned and belong to old times where languages were legal and talked about nature.
32. Bring your own spoon by Saad Z Hossain: This was the story I was looking most forward to in this collection. Unfortunately I haven't read the author's Djinn but have read Gurkha and Lord of Tuesday. Set in the same universe, a Djinn, a human and a river pirate try to open a restaurant in a world where food is made from algae. It could have been funny if the world wasn't so sad.
This was a good read.
August 16, 2022
A well-curated collection that represents the diversity, power and elegance of voices in sci-fi from across South Asia. This anthology is a gateway to an entire genre retold in important and underrepresented voices.
Best stories:
-And Now His Lordship is Laughing (Shiv Ramdas)
-The Glow-in-the-Dark Girls (Senaa Ahmad)
-The Song of Ice (Soham Guha, transl. Arunava Sinha)
-Goodbye is the Shape of a Palm Pressed to the Sky (Lavanya Lakshminarayan)
-Almost Human (Kehkashan Khalid)
-A Different Sea (Vandana Singh)
-The List (Gautam Bhatia)
-Champollion’s Foot (Haris A. Durrani)
-The Arrival of the New World (Premee Mohamed)
———
The Traveller (Tashan Mehta) -
“wonder shared is wonder multiplied”
The Glow-in-the-Dark Girls (Senaa Ahmad) -
“Those were the old days. Now it is not the days that are old, but ourselves.”
The Ministry of Relevance (Arjun Raj Gaind) -
“the inevitable entropy of dreams”
The Song of Ice (Soham Guha) -
“The world was not ours to inherit - it was a loan from our children, with interest due.”
Champollion’s Foot (Haris A. Durrani) -
“consciousness without conscience is not consciousness at all.”
Shambhala (Salik Shah) -
“The sun and the moon and all the stars are out there. But they don't need us. They are simply there, being, existing.”
Best stories:
-And Now His Lordship is Laughing (Shiv Ramdas)
-The Glow-in-the-Dark Girls (Senaa Ahmad)
-The Song of Ice (Soham Guha, transl. Arunava Sinha)
-Goodbye is the Shape of a Palm Pressed to the Sky (Lavanya Lakshminarayan)
-Almost Human (Kehkashan Khalid)
-A Different Sea (Vandana Singh)
-The List (Gautam Bhatia)
-Champollion’s Foot (Haris A. Durrani)
-The Arrival of the New World (Premee Mohamed)
———
The Traveller (Tashan Mehta) -
“wonder shared is wonder multiplied”
The Glow-in-the-Dark Girls (Senaa Ahmad) -
“Those were the old days. Now it is not the days that are old, but ourselves.”
The Ministry of Relevance (Arjun Raj Gaind) -
“the inevitable entropy of dreams”
The Song of Ice (Soham Guha) -
“The world was not ours to inherit - it was a loan from our children, with interest due.”
Champollion’s Foot (Haris A. Durrani) -
“consciousness without conscience is not consciousness at all.”
Shambhala (Salik Shah) -
“The sun and the moon and all the stars are out there. But they don't need us. They are simply there, being, existing.”
January 19, 2022
Some interesting stories in this anthology that has contributions from authors around South Asia including from India, Pakistan, China and more. Some of the stories seemed not so well edited and several challenged me with having too little context for me to settle into and understand plot. However, overall it was a good read (long too with 723 pages!).
Read
February 18, 2022“I can’t help thinking somewhere in the universe there has to be something better than man. Has to be.”-Taylor, Planet of the Apes.
Don’t we all resonate with this one and believe in it? Yes, indeed there surely has got to be someone else apart from humankind, alive and very much existent in this wide, wide universe. Some species on whom ride the complete habitat balance of that constellation, the ergonomics of life and nature on that particular planet, asteroid or star. Have you guys given this a thought? Yes, life exists in different forms and species and Science fiction is surely one genre that explores the quantum and depth of this hypothesis.
Our title in review today, THE Gollancz Book of South Asian Science Fiction Volume 2 is one such fabulous piece of writing that not only explores horror, fantasy, alien, time travel, space and climatic fiction but does so in a non-contemporary, futuristic kind of detailing. Agreed all forms of science fiction are formulated on the basis of some kind of metaphoric, abstract inspirations drawn from prevalent or historical perceptions, yet this one differs in the modicum that not only is the writing style a more modernistic, refreshing one but so are the different subject ideas, core plots, their execution of situational happenings, the incidentals, the characterizations and the complete portrayal of alternate, possible hypotheses and realities which could possibly indicate the presence of another dimension of the metaverse as we know it.
This is the second book of Golliancz South Asian Science fiction. 32 Stories and poems from India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Tibet and such places have been included in this one.
Containing concepts from converting humans to bioweapons, climatic apocalypses, first Alien contacts to sophisticated surveillance employed to population controlling, ideas seemed to have simply pulsated in a 360-degree manner, having written and executed from a multi-dynamic spectrum and vantage.
My personal favourite from a host of writers Indian as well as International was “The Song Of Ice” translated from Bengali by Arunava Sinha, the piece which speaks of climatic catastrophe.
Another one by Sri Lankan author Navin Weeraratne is a dystopic set in an underground world where libraries are no longer existent. Another brilliantly conceptualized piece.
The Maker of Memorials by Vajra Chandrasekara speaks of a human who creates war memorials, working alongside the “Prehistory department”. Yes, you heard right. These guys are into making pieces that will rewrite history. Uncannily interesting huh?
2020-NKARV a stirring yet playful kind of poem by Kaiser Haq from Bangladesh is a pandemic related piece speaking of compassion and sensitivity in these troubled times.
Bring your own spoon by Saad Z Hossain is a story of a jinn who decides on helping the main character Hanu set up a kitchen to prepare food for residents of climatically affected Dhaka. A piece that speaks optimism in volumes and also subtly nudges us to stand united in these uncertain times.
All in all, 32 pieces, 32 voices with the kind of talented writing that will shake the realms of your traditional thought processes, compelling you to move beyond the ordinary visualization of the world, taking you to oblivions that are much more specifically and intricately detailed out for the perusal of your not only your mind’s eye but also a treat for rummaging around within the unexplored horizons you might otherwise refrain from going to.
A very good book for those who wish to read and indulge in different forms of science fiction and revel in the amazing concepts of the same. Nor to forget the stellar pieces of writing by some of the best Authors, having been amalgamated for you in this one.
Don’t we all resonate with this one and believe in it? Yes, indeed there surely has got to be someone else apart from humankind, alive and very much existent in this wide, wide universe. Some species on whom ride the complete habitat balance of that constellation, the ergonomics of life and nature on that particular planet, asteroid or star. Have you guys given this a thought? Yes, life exists in different forms and species and Science fiction is surely one genre that explores the quantum and depth of this hypothesis.
Our title in review today, THE Gollancz Book of South Asian Science Fiction Volume 2 is one such fabulous piece of writing that not only explores horror, fantasy, alien, time travel, space and climatic fiction but does so in a non-contemporary, futuristic kind of detailing. Agreed all forms of science fiction are formulated on the basis of some kind of metaphoric, abstract inspirations drawn from prevalent or historical perceptions, yet this one differs in the modicum that not only is the writing style a more modernistic, refreshing one but so are the different subject ideas, core plots, their execution of situational happenings, the incidentals, the characterizations and the complete portrayal of alternate, possible hypotheses and realities which could possibly indicate the presence of another dimension of the metaverse as we know it.
This is the second book of Golliancz South Asian Science fiction. 32 Stories and poems from India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Tibet and such places have been included in this one.
Containing concepts from converting humans to bioweapons, climatic apocalypses, first Alien contacts to sophisticated surveillance employed to population controlling, ideas seemed to have simply pulsated in a 360-degree manner, having written and executed from a multi-dynamic spectrum and vantage.
My personal favourite from a host of writers Indian as well as International was “The Song Of Ice” translated from Bengali by Arunava Sinha, the piece which speaks of climatic catastrophe.
Another one by Sri Lankan author Navin Weeraratne is a dystopic set in an underground world where libraries are no longer existent. Another brilliantly conceptualized piece.
The Maker of Memorials by Vajra Chandrasekara speaks of a human who creates war memorials, working alongside the “Prehistory department”. Yes, you heard right. These guys are into making pieces that will rewrite history. Uncannily interesting huh?
2020-NKARV a stirring yet playful kind of poem by Kaiser Haq from Bangladesh is a pandemic related piece speaking of compassion and sensitivity in these troubled times.
Bring your own spoon by Saad Z Hossain is a story of a jinn who decides on helping the main character Hanu set up a kitchen to prepare food for residents of climatically affected Dhaka. A piece that speaks optimism in volumes and also subtly nudges us to stand united in these uncertain times.
All in all, 32 pieces, 32 voices with the kind of talented writing that will shake the realms of your traditional thought processes, compelling you to move beyond the ordinary visualization of the world, taking you to oblivions that are much more specifically and intricately detailed out for the perusal of your not only your mind’s eye but also a treat for rummaging around within the unexplored horizons you might otherwise refrain from going to.
A very good book for those who wish to read and indulge in different forms of science fiction and revel in the amazing concepts of the same. Nor to forget the stellar pieces of writing by some of the best Authors, having been amalgamated for you in this one.
July 10, 2024
It's such a joy reading science fiction stories peppered with south asian elements! (Finding references to things like biryani in a sci-fi story feels great! Having consumed western science fiction all my life, I see now that I was deprived of reading Indian names for example in stories. These little things really stood out.) But ofcourse, the science fiction is also of quality in these short stories! So glad they made a second volume!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
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